


I Am the Highway

by aswiftlytiltinguniverse



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Angst, Break Up, Cheating, F/M, Lots of Angst, Post-Break Up, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, this is not a happy fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-21
Updated: 2017-05-20
Packaged: 2018-11-03 02:14:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,577
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10957551
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aswiftlytiltinguniverse/pseuds/aswiftlytiltinguniverse
Summary: Just because fate dictates that you belong together, doesn't mean you will be. You and Bucky learn that the hard way.





	1. You

**Author's Note:**

> This work takes inspiration from the song "I Am the Highway" by Audioslave. I wrote it because I got sick of reading fanfiction from all genres where the main character (Bucky in this instance) cheats and the reader take them back every single time. There isn't always a happy ending and I wanted to show that.

Tony doesn't say anything as he sits in the chair beside you, where you lay in the hospital bed hooked up to an IV drip, picking at the lint on your sheets and blankets. He has his sunglasses on and it's probably for the best because you're way past cried out, but you don't want to take a chance on crying even more. Just by the way he's clenching his jaw, you can tell he's trying not to cry himself and that's a hard pill on its own to swallow. He has one arm thrown over the back of his chair, his free hand holding a Styrofoam cup of shitty hospital coffee and one ankle resting over his knee. He's the picture of casual indifference, but you know him, know that it hurts him to see what you've done to yourself. His head is tilted down and he's staring at the white bandage around your left wrist.

You tug at the edge of the gauze wrapped around your self-inflicted wound. It's a new habit you've developed over the past two days. Today is the first day you've been allowed visitors. You look over Tony's shoulder and out the window. "I didn't want the reminder," you inform him, gratified that your voice is solid and firm. There's a weight off your shoulders knowing it's gone, knowing you'll never have to see it again, knowing that shadow of the life you've willingly walked away from won't be haunting your every step.

"All you had to do was call me and I could have had it done professionally," his tone is clipped as he speaks, lifting the cup to his mouth to sip at it as he stares at the rest of your hospital room. "They have you on suicide watch because of this."

You can only shrug. "It's 'up the road, not across the street,' Tony. If I wanted to die, I would have done it the right way."

"Why am I your emergency contact?"

You let your head fall back on the pillow and wipe at your nose. The room smells heavily of disinfectant and it's making your allergies flare up. "Because I didn't have anyone else and I know you won't tell anyone."

"You mailed your credit card back." He leans forward, reaching into the pocket of his Armani blazer, and tosses a new black credit card down next to the cup of ice chips sitting on your tray. "I got you a new one. You're the card holder. I set you up with your own account, enough money to get by on. No one can trace it; FRIDAY made sure of that."

You don't say anything. What is there to say? You pick at the edge of your bandage again. The silence isn't comfortable, per se, but you sense that he's wallowing in the same type of misery that has been dogging you for the better part of six months. He needs support, so you give it him. "I feel better." He just looks at you and you tap the underside of your wrist. "With it gone. I don't feel so...shattered. I feel like I'm free and it was just a bad dream."

"And all the good stuff that happened before you took off?"

You shrug again. It seems like that's all you can do. "All just part of the same nightmare."

Tony sets his now empty coffee cup down on the tray and crosses his arms across his chest. "You know, there's files on this. Hydra files. They hypothesized about this, that if you willingly cut the connection-"

"I started thinking about it, the day I did it," you say, your words shutting him up immediately, "I started thinking about how there had to be some way to make it stop hurting, to make it just go away, to make myself feel whole for one damn moment in my life. Just one moment of relief would be enough. It was my last chance to make it stop, so I took it, and I don't regret it. I can't regret it."

His jaw flexes, relaxes, as he cocks his head to the side. "I would have helped you."

"I know," you tell him, and you do know that, "but they would have found out. It would have torn the team apart again. The Avengers are more important than me."

He sniffs and rolls his shoulders, shaking his head. "I _knew_. I fucking _knew_ something bad happened. All that cash you withdrew that night, dumping your phone in the Hudson. You left with nothing and you never came back, reached out to any of us. I just. Fucking. Knew. And then your company insurance was billed for an appointment-"

"Please don't say it, Tony-"

"-at Planned Parenthood and I knew," His voice catches and he clears his throat, "I knew you were done and you weren't coming back. You're never coming back, are you?"

You're crying again. This pain, you hadn't quite gotten over. You won't get over it. One night. That bastard had ruined your life in one night. From that point on, it had been nothing but a surreal out of body experience in which your mind had shut down and you'd gone into autopilot for the first month and a half. The only question you could ask in all that time was "How?" How had your life gotten to that point? Where everything had just been upended and obliterated. Would it have been better if you'd never come home early? Would it be worse? Or was there some other point in time that was days, weeks, perhaps even months beforehand that could have prevented it? Maybe some decision you'd made that had seemed innocuous at the time, but was absolutely paramount in shaping your future? You'd gone over every day of your entire existence from start to finish and tried to pinpoint every moment that led up to it. That along with the pain and the sheer sense of loss had driven you nearly insane with desperation.

Tony lurches forward and grabs onto your hand with both of his. "You don't have to come back, honey. Just tell me you'll be okay. Tell me you'll keep going."

"He took everything from me," you hiccup, "I don't know how to _be_ without him and I need to-I can't-"

He's out of his chair, bending over your bed to cradle you in his arms. Tony has and always will be your favorite Avenger. He will always be the one person to stand by your side and do right by you. "It's okay, it's okay."

Tony holds you until you stop crying. You're not as empty and broken as you were a mere seventy-two hours ago. You can feel it. It still hurts like hell, but for the first time, there's hope. You know that Tony's right; it's okay.

* * *

There are lots of working theories about this "connection", the one you'd broken. The majority of the population are under the impression that it's forever, nothing in the world can sever it. Poems and songs are written about it, extoling its virtues. But to you, you know it's a lie. It causes nothing, but grief and agony and hurts worse than any bullet or knife to the heart. You've never been shot or stabbed, but you would have gladly had either mortal injury if it meant erasing the pain of enduring the emotional and physical turmoil that had been dealt to you.

That pain had tortured you for nearly six months, forced you to mutilate yourself in order to end it. Most commit suicide, but not you. You want the life that it tried to steal away from you. You want the happiness and fulfillment it promised you and then denied you of so cruelly. You don't need its eternity, you just need this lifetime.

As you swayed drunkenly through the days and months, you made a list of all the things outside of him that made living worthwhile. Rain. Stars. Sunshine. Puppies. Kittens. Road Trips. Pizza. Ice Cream. Dancing. Books. Music. Slushies. Fuzzy socks. Carnivals. Swimming pools. Over-sized hoodies. Christmas. Soon, that list was pages long and you were sure that the festering wound he'd left in place of your heart needed to be excised. You downed a bottle of the most expensive whiskey you could get your hands on, popped several pain-killers, and slowly carved your flesh from your wrist. It hurt like a bitch, but with every sanguine slice, he faded further and further from you. You couldn't quite remember the sound of his voice nor the warmth it held when he spoke to you. You couldn't remember what it felt like when he held you or when he kissed you and whispered all the those sweet nothings in your ear that turned out to be exactly that.

There was a lot of blood; the hotel bathroom looked like an absolute crime scene and you'd had to call for an ambulance before you passed out. People would look at you with pity now, but it was worth it.

You're far past the wallowing and loneliness. Tony was right. It's okay now. You're living and you're happy and you're glowing. You're traveling the world and meeting new people and taking awful selfies to send to Tony so he knows you're okay. Sometimes, he comes with you to the more clandestine locations and the two of you take awful selfies together. Tony begs you to come see him in New York only once. He meets you at the Plaza and he shows you his left wrist. You run your fingers over the bare skin. It's smoother and softer than it should be. It's bare. His eyes are shining, light. "You were right."

That night, the two of you go to a tattoo parlor and get matching tattoos on your left wrists. You don't do it to cover up what's missing. You do it to show what you've both found.

He never talks to you about the Avengers and you never ask about them. Maybe it's cruel of you, to go on without giving any of your old friends closure, but you couldn't ever go back there and you were happier without them. They would move on the way people always do. They would be okay.

But as you know, all too well, all good things must come to an end and from all ends come new beginnings. You know this because from the ashes of what was once you and Bucky Barnes, you rose like a phoenix.

* * *

**_Then..._ **

Working for Tony Stark could be draining. Being a part of Tony Starks legal team while trying to renegotiate the terms of the Accords was enough to put any man into an early grave. You'd made some headway on capital hill. In fact, you'd made enough progress that you'd been able to fly home early. It was what you needed. You and Bucky had been running since the helicarriers fell in DC, and the moment you'd been able to stop enjoy life, with him out of cryo in Wakanda and the two of you finally settled down in Stark tower, you were forced to fly out to DC every other week to lobby hard for the Accords to be amended and revised. There was no down time, ever, and the two of you needed it.

You missed him. You couldn't remember a time through out your relationship that you hadn't missed him. From that moment he found you standing in front of his memorial at the Smithsonian with his name etched into your wrist by fate itself ("who are you," he'd snarled as he gripped that wrist like a vice), to the moment he'd asked you to wait for him as he voluntarily went into cryostasis one final time.

You were weary but giddy as you unlocked the front door to your living quarters, letting your bags thud against the carpet as softly as possible. It was late and if Bucky was asleep, you didn't want to wake him. He had such a hard time sleeping peacefully.

But you could hear his rough baritone from the bedroom and it caused the giddiness in your chest to dissipate into a sense of impending dread. You could feel it before you heard her. Heard the moaning. That high-pitched "Oh, God, fuck me harder, Bucky, harder!" is what had your entire being suddenly numb yet writhing internally with pain.

There was a trail of clothing leading from the living room down the hallway to your shared bedroom and your traitorous body followed it like Hansel and Gretel following a trail of bread crumbs. Your mind was trying to reason with you that you had to see it to know it was real, that if you saw it, your heart could let go and you would be okay.

The door was cracked.

"You gonna cum on my cock, Pretty Girl," he growled out as he thrust into her from behind and that was all you needed to see and hear. White noise was blaring in your ears as you stumbled silently out the front door, keys falling and clattering on the floor of the hallway as you walked toward the elevator. _Run, get away, don't look back. Don't look back. Breathe, breathe, breathe. Keep breathing and run._

FRIDAY was calling for you overhead, but you couldn't hear her, not really. You could hear the panic beginning to mount in the AI's voice as she repeated your name over and over. You couldn't open your mouth to respond even if you had wanted to. You withdrew every bit of money you had in the bank from the ATM in the lobby and left, pausing halfway out the door when FRIDAY hesitantly said your name one last time. "I'm so sorry."

You hailed a cab. You hadn't cried yet and the driver kept giving you worried looks. Your phone wouldn't stop ringing. Tony. Tony. Tony. Tony. Tony. Tony. Just Tony. Tony had called you for the thirty-sixth time and you'd hit the ignore button for the thirty-sixth time when Bucky's face flashed across the screen and it began to buzz and ring. Then you cried. Angry hot tears slipped down your face as you rejected the call and asked the driver with a choked sob to pull over at the Hudson river. Bucky was calling you for the seventeenth time when you chucked your phone into the murky water and climbed back into the cab.

You left New York City that night. It wasn't until you were on the red eye to LAX that you finally looked back.

* * *

**_Now..._ **

It's Tony's birthday in a week. You're standing in the park, under the sun, watching kids play on the jungle gym and swing set. He's planning on coming to visit you. You're both doing better than ever. Neither of you feels like you have to live up to someone else's ridiculous standard. You belong to yourselves and you're happy. You're in charge of your own destinies, not fate. Not anymore.

Tony's still Iron Man. He's still brilliant. He's dating and having fun and being Tony. He's your best friend. And you're his. You tell each other everything and nothing.

The stray dog you adopted a year ago is the only man in your life. He's huge, with a curly tail, floppy ears, and sad puppy eyes. You are his world. You are okay with this because he loves you for who you are and he is loyal to a fault. Especially now. He's sitting patiently at your feet as you chatter on the phone to Tony. You nudge your dog with your foot, indicating that it's time to go home. He's on his feet and trotting patiently beside you, mindful of your now delicate condition.

"I just don't see why my sperm wasn't good enough is all," Tony laments for what has to be the millionth time. You smile ruefully to yourself as you cross the street, rolling your eyes as he outright whines, "I'm a genius billionaire! I'm Iron Man!"

"That's quite the reputation to live up to," you remind him gently. "I just want normal."

"But we'd make such pretty babies!"

"I only want one pretty baby and it's currently gestating in my uterus."

"I'm hiring you a nanny!"

Laughter bursts out of you, loud and boisterous and you can just picture the proud smirk on your best friend's face. "You are not! I'm perfectly capable of doing this all on my own."

"Not even part time?"

"Maybe," you relent, eyes trained on the sky above you as you slowly saunter down the sidewalk. You drop your hand to rest on your swelling abdomen. You could go for some pizza soon. "And I guess, if I decide to have another one, you can be the father."

"Can we do it the old fashioned way?"

"Don't be gross, Anthony," you chastise, but your shoulders are shaking and you're trying not to cry as you stifle your giggling. You can't stop thinking about pizza. Tony Stark trying to flirt his way into your pants isn't even a blip on your radar right now.

"I'm amazing in bed, just so you know, I mean it's pretty much one of my finest sets of skills."

"You're an idiot. A horny idiot," you tell him fondly as the last of your laughter tapers off. Now, Tony's trying, yet again, to persuade you to move back to New York and you half listen as you rub your stomach and shake your head.

"How do you feel about some pizza, Pretty Boy," you ask your canine companion, watching his ears perk up. He stops and licks at his own snout. "Does pizza sound good for my pretty, pretty boy?" You know your voice is bordering on sugary sweet, but you can't help it. Tony lets out a grunt of disgust. "I can't believe you call him that. There's something wrong with you mentally if you're calling him by your ex's pet name."

"It's a pet name, he is a pet, and he is a very pretty boy," you reason nonchalantly, "besides, he's the only man I'll ever need in my life."

"Bestiality suits you," Tony quips with ease and you snort with laughter before he adds on. "He _is_ a pretty dog."

"I know he is," you agree before looking down at your dog to coo some more, "he's a very pretty boy! Oh, yes, he is! Yes, he is. He's the prettiest boy ever and I love him ever so much!"

His curly, fluffy, white tails is wagging furiously as you scratch behind his ears and make kissing noises. His entire back end is wiggling. Tony lets out another sound of disgust and the line goes dead. But you don't care because you're too busy fawning over your dog as you promise him his very own pizza and another walk in the park after dinner.

"C'mon, my pretty boy, let's go home," you tell him and you turn to continue on your way, but stop dead in your tracks. Bucky Barnes is standing not even six feet away from you. His eyes are wide, as if he can't believe you're actually there in the flesh before him. You're body is taut with tension like a bowstring. You never wanted this. How did he find you? You don't bother asking because you don't want to know. You've thought about this moment possibly happening, hoping it never would. But now it is. What should you do? Just walk around him? You cut your eyes down to your dog. His eyes are trained on Bucky, the brown, black, and white fur on his back standing on end. He knows this person is a threat to you in some way. He steps in front of you and lowers his head and growls. You don't call him to heel, you don't reassure him. He is protecting you the way you should have been protected a long time ago.

For a moment, you stare directly into Bucky's clear blue eyes. There are so many questions there, so much pain, so much loss, and you feel nothing. You used to get lost in those eyes, but now your path is set and you guide yourself and your still growling dog around him as if you're a river flowing around a rock. "C'mon, let's go home."

The farther away you get, the calmer you feel. Your dogs licks your hand and you scratch under his chin, looking at the words scrawled across your wrist in black ink. _I am the highway._ You never look back.


	2. Bucky

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bucky remembers what he forgot a long time ago, but now it's time for him to let go.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you want sunshine and rainbows and unicorns, you won't find it here.

It was FRIDAY that had told him you weren't coming back. After he finally noticed your luggage by the front door. And panic set in. Pure panic. That was when he knew. He'd just wanted to know. How stupid. Why did it matter? You loved him and he loved you. It should have been that simple. It was that simple. He knows that now. But it's still too late.

"She's gone, Sergeant Barnes. And she won't be coming back." Friday's voice was cold, void of emotion, like the doctors who had once monitored him while he was in Hydra's care. She sounded like the AI she was, for once.

He couldn't breathe, all the air was gone, no oxygen. Did it matter if you were his soulmate? Did it? He was yours and you fit him so well and he was finally happy. He'd had so many reasons even a mere hour ago, but...nothing. He had nothing.

Your keys were laying on the floor in the hallway. His hands were shaking, both flesh and metal as he called you again and again, each call going straight to voicemail.

It had started out with the wondering of whether you were his or if he was ever meant to have one. He couldn't remember. Steve mentioned that he'd had a mark, but that he kept it hidden because it made no sense. Steve had asked one last time to see the name, but Bucky had told him only, "It's not a name." Steve said he stopped asking after that.

More and more doubt crept in and he'd started looking, wondering if he was the only one who hadn't had a name, but something different. File after Hydra file revealed nothing. But he was already looking. He was looking for you, but not seeing that he had already found you.

The brunette with the butterflies and flowers tattooed around her wrist had been what he thought he was looking for. She'd never had a mark and she'd covered up the empty space to keep herself from being reminded of it. He could say it started out innocent, but that was a lie. There was flirting on both ends and it may have been shallow, but he enjoyed the fact that you weren't the only one who found his bionic arm a turn on. She'd sucked the vibranium digits and then his dick in the back of the bar the very first night they met. You were in DC for a full two weeks; there was no way you would ever know and once you were back, he could pretend it never happened.

Had he always been like this? Was he likes this growing up in Brooklyn? Or was this something new and dark about himself that he'd managed to bury because he was too busy running for his life? What was this? The Winter Soldier was unfeeling and cruel. He had been so cruel to you. Was this a side effect of having become an amalgamation of two contrasting personalities?

The pain was bearable at first. Something was missing, you, but he could numb that with alcohol and photographs of the two of you together. The littered the now hollowed out apartment. Empty liquor bottles, broken picture frames and ratty journal pages were the new décor. Months spent trying to unravel his psyche and just fucking remember. He'd thrown it all away on the off-chance of knowing some day. He had to know now.

Nobody asked questions. Steve pretended nothing was different. Natasha was stoic. Tony was busy drinking himself into a stupor (still) over Pepper.

One month after you left, Tony got especially sloshed and attacked him in the training room, suited up in his Iron Man gear. Tony almost killed him; Bucky wished he had.

Sixth months after you'd left, Tony left the tower and didn't come back for almost two weeks. Bucky wouldn't have noticed until Natasha and Steve started speculating as to his whereabouts. Still, Bucky couldn't quite bring himself to care about Tony Stark. There wasn't enough liquor in the world to smother the pain he was feeling. It hadn't gotten better, it had gotten worse; hit him like a truck right in the chest. Something had reached right into him and rent his insides apart and hollowed him out. It had woken him from a dead sleep, the sheer agony of it. A month later, he finally realized that this was the night before Tony left.

It's that night, he now knows, that he is no longer **yours.**

The days get longer. Tony's stopped drinking so much. He kept himself busy, but he's stopped prying into everyone's personal lives. Steve was relieved. Natasha was suspicious. Bucky was suspicious. The journal pages remained scattered across the floor of his apartment. His eyes burn and they're red from crying for hours on end.

You'd gotten him a new journal and gifted it to him the day you left for DC. A year after you left, he finally worked up the courage to write in it.

_"I gave up on her. She never gave up on me."_

* * *

It's not getting better for him. He is dying a slow and agonizing death. It's strange, feeling and being aware of the way your body is giving up on a cellular level. He can get drunk now. Before, he could only numb himself, but now Bucky will drink until he blacks out.

He's in the hospital vison blurred, slowly coming back into consciousness after having had his stomach pumped. Steve and Tony are arguing at the foot of the bed. They always argue.

"What happened?"

"You passed out in a pool of your own vomit and almost drown," Tony tells him a voice that's almost cheery. He's scrolling through his phone like he has better things to do and Bucky knows Tony probably thinks he actually does. Tony's been talking about retiring from being Iron Man, train someone else to take over for him. He says he wants to be normal. Steve's convinced it's just a phase. Bucky and Natasha aren't so sure. Someone keeps sending him pictures that he won't share with anyone else that FRIDAY has encrypted and password protected. Natasha tries every now and then to crack it, but every time she gets half-way through the first layer, FRIDAY's already finished recoding the encryption and Natasha's locked out in record time. He takes his private jet and flies all over the world and goes dark for weeks on end. He doesn't talk about where he's going or tell anyone where's been once he's back and FRIDAY covers his tracks too well for anyone on the team to run surveillance on him.

"You should have let me die." Bucky means it. He wants to die. He's ready. Every single cell in his body is screaming for him to let go and he's trying to do what it takes to silence them, to make it all just end.

"Bucky-"

"No, Steve." His voice is scratchy and he turns his head away from the cup of water offered to him. "I deserve this."

Tony doesn't even bother to open his mouth to try to refute this claim, like Steve is.

Once he's back in the tower, Bucky tries to keep going, if only to appease his best friend. He stops drinking, stops holing himself up in the apartment. He goes out and lives life the way he used to, just...without you. He holds the hands of different women, takes them out on first dates that are also the last. He's charming and polite and everything he was when he was with you, but now it means nothing. They don't feel like you or sound like you, or look enough like you to make him forget that they're not you. They'd give him everything-some have tried to do just that-but they will never be you and that's what he yearns for more than anything.

Every night, he goes home to his journal, the one you gave him with the words "Pretty Boy" pressed into the leather cover, and writes the same thing he always does.

_"I gave up on her. She never gave up on me."_

Eventually, the pages will fill up. That's when it will end.

It's been over a year. A year, three months, two weeks, three days, and twelve hours since you left. Somehow, he's still there. He's breathing and moving and going through life in a blur. None of it is real. Your pillow doesn't smell like you anymore, but he remembers the scent vividly, he remembers the soft lilt of your voice, the feel of tender kisses you used to trail up the scarred ruin of his left shoulder before you wrapped your arms around him after a nightmare that was too much for him. He remembers all these things and so much more and it hurts more than any memory of his old life or what he endured at the hands of Hydra. They never ripped his soul apart; he did that all on his own.

The Lucky Charms in his cereal bowl are soggy. He doesn't even remember pouring himself a bowl. But he remembers your smile.

Steve and Sam are joking about who's the faster runner while Natasha throws out a pithy remark here or there. Tony's on his phone, as usual. And Bucky is staring at his bowl of soggy cereal.

"When'd you get a tattoo, Stark?"

"A couple months ago," he responds flippantly, not bothering to say anything further. Natasha's staring at him now, hard and unyielding, but Tony won't fold. He's too busy looking at photos of someone's overgrown yet painfully adorable dog. Bucky continues to stare at his cereal.

"'I am the Highway,'" Steve muses aloud and Bucky feels himself freeze, his heartbeat pick up like the beating of a hummingbird's wings. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"Well, it's a metaphor," Tony tells Steve as if he's a small child. Their playful banter continues on until the sound of Bucky's cereal bowl shattering on the floor has everyone jumping to attention.

But Bucky's not in the kitchen, he's standing in the doorway of Steve's apartment in Brooklyn, getting ready to leave for another night on the town.

"C'mon, Buck, I know you got a name," Steve wheedles, smiling widely. He's so short and so small. "You stare at your wrist enough that I know you got one. You've seen mine. Why can't you just tell me, you big jerk?"

Bucky looks down and pulls the sleeve of his shirt back just enough to make out the black words scrawled across his wrist. _I am the Highway._ "It's not a name."

He doesn't wait for Steve's response as he leaves. Reality comes crashing into him with a furious jolt as Steve takes him by the shoulders and begins shaking him. He can only imagine the look on his face, because Steve is looking at him like he knows Bucky just remembered something awful. He slumps back against the counter, watches the milk drip off the side and creep across the floor, discolored from the marshmallows. "I am the Highway. It wasn't a name. It was those words."

Steve pulls away as if he's been burned as he watches Bucky clutch at his metal wrist. The silence that follows is broken only when Tony begins to laugh. He laughs and laughs and laughs until he's crying. He's still laughing like a crazed lunatic as he leaves the room, one hand clutching his aching stomach.

Natasha doesn't say anything. She simply snatches Tony's phone off the counter and leaves the room.

* * *

Bucky's not sure how Natasha got in to his apartment, but he senses her presence, hopes it's a different assassin who's infiltrated the tower; one who's bent on destroying him. She tosses something at him from the darkness. It bounces on the bed beside his prone form. "I thought you should know." She's gone, becoming one with the shadows.

It's Tony's phone and it's filled with pictures of you. Pictures of you in a hospital bed, pictures of you in different cities around the world, pictures of you and that dog. There are pictures of you and Tony. You look happy in most of them.

There's dozens of videos of you and Tony. They're nothing interesting, just the two of you out and about together, exploring new and far off places. The sound of you laughing has Bucky choking up, biting his lip to keep from sobbing.

The worst is the video of you and Tony in a tattoo parlor. The recording starts with Tony handing his phone off to you as he seats himself in the chair.

"If anyone's going to be posting a video of this online, it's going to be me, and if you leak this to the press, I will sue the hell out of you," Tony tells the tattoo artist. He looks up at you and rolls his eyes. "Okay, I'm sorry, please don't misspell anything on purpose."

The needle buzzes to life and you squeal off camera. Tony flinches. "Yep, definitely doesn't tickle. I can't believe I'm doing this for you."

"This was your idea!"

"Well, I was drunk when I came up with it and now that I'm sober, I have seen the error of my ways!"

The camera shakes as you laugh. "But girls dig tattoos. Ironman with tattoos, all the ladies will come a runnin'!"

"Don't patronize me," he snaps, but there's no bite to his words as he addresses the smirking tattooist, "are you done yet? It's only four words!"

Eventually, the tattoo artists is finished and you take Tony's place. You're biting your lip nervously.

"You can't back out or I won't be your best friend anymore."

"Pressure," you exclaim, flipping him off. He scoffs at you from behind the camera. "Rude."

"Feisty," you correct, sticking your nose in the air. The tattoo artist eyes your wrist with a frown and the smile slides of your face. There's a flicker of something in your eyes then, something Bucky knows he feels each and everyday.

"Are you gonna give her the ink or not?" Tony's voice is chilly. The tattooist give you an apologetic smile. "Sorry, I've just never done a cover up where someone...did that."

"It's not really a cover up," you say, and even though your voice doesn't waver, you swallow thickly. "There's nothing there to cover up."

"The scar tissue-"

"What about the fucking scar tissue," Tony snaps, "do we need to go somewhere else for this?"

But you're getting irritated, too. "Yeah, I cut it off. I cut off my fucking soulmark! Now fucking ink me."

The video cuts off abruptly after that. The wallpaper on Tony's phone is of your wrist and Tony's wrist, side by side, with the same words inked across them. They're the words that used to be on Bucky's own left wrist.

There is nothing left for Bucky but to find you.

* * *

It's a nice town with nice people and Bucky can see why you chose to settle here. It's a good place. It's stable and normal and small and idyllic. It seems separate from the rest of the world. Or maybe he just thinks it's perfect because you're here living and breathing.

You're not home. You're at the park, walking your dog as you talk on the phone and watch kids play on the playground. He watches you for a while. Just seeing you is enough for the moment. Maybe he'll try to talk to you tomorrow. Try to fix this.

Your laughter behind him is what stops him in his tracks. He turns to face you. Your dogs is walking beside you and you're staring up at the sky and the trees lining the sidewalk as you listen to whoever it is on the other end of the line.

"How do you feel about some pizza, Pretty Boy," you ask your canine companion, watching his ears perk up. It's jarring, to Bucky, to hear you call your dog that so easily. It's a serrated knife to the gut for him. You're just so happy. He's never seen you this happy. The person on the other line says something that has you smirking.

"It's a pet name, he is a pet, and he is a very pretty boy," you tell them in a breezy tone, "besides, he's the only man I'll ever need in my life."

Him. They mentioned him and you didn't break the way he breaks when someone mentions you. You've moved on. You're happy now. He's not with you and you're happy and _he's not with you and you're happy._

"He's a very pretty boy! Oh, yes, he is! Yes, he is. He's the prettiest boy ever and I love him ever so much!"

Your dog is shivering with joy as you fawn over him and Bucky remembers that feeling. That pain is the pain he wants to live with. But he won't. Because you tell your dog it's time to go home and then the two of you are staring into each other's eyes and past the shock he sees there, there's nothing. He looks as miserable as he feels and you say nothing. You don't smile and all the happiness that was there a second ago, is now gone. You're staring at stranger. Bucky is a stranger to you. He is someone you don't know and don't care to know. He means nothing to you.

You direct your dog around him and keep walking and you don't look back.

It's over. He searched for all the answers, never stopping to consider that the answers wouldn't be what he wanted or what he ever needed.

Bucky doesn't follow you. You don't owe him anything, even though you both know he owes you everything. So, he can give you this. He can let you go.

But he still writes about you. In his journal, he writes down everything he remembers about you until there's not a moment left unrecorded. These are the memories he needs. He doesn't need to remember what happened before Hydra or even when he was with Hydra because it was always you that mattered most and he won't lose sight of that again-even if you're not there anymore.

He doesn't ask Tony about you. Tony knows; Tony knows everything. Tony doesn't retire from being Iron Man. The two of you don't fall in love and live happily ever after. You live your lives and you live them happily enough. Enough. That's what it has to be for the three of you. It has to be enough.


End file.
